Owner vows to retrieve the Wilhelm Baum

Sunday

Mar 9, 2014 at 1:00 PM

Kristin HaySpecial to The Sentinel

The Wilhelm Baum, a 1923 tugboat that has worked as a U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary search and rescue vessel, mysteriously sank recently at a South Haven dock.Owner Jim Bradley said he worked on the boat at 8 a.m. on Sunday, Feb. 23, and when he returned later that day at 1 p.m., the tug had disappeared below the icy surface with only the antenna, the smokestack and a portion of the pilothouse visible."It is well below the surface in nine feet of water,"' Bradley said. "The cause is unknown and so is the future."However, he plans to retrieve it when the ice recedes and float it again.Built in 1923 for the Army Corps of Engineers, Bradley acquired the boat in 1973. He said it once belonged to the King Company, a dredging firm in Holland.In addition to rescuing distressed boaters for more than 30 years, the tug has helped Bradley track and discover shipwrecks. Bradley worked for many years as commercial diver. He equipped the tug with side and forward scanners, GPS chart plotter and a remote operated underwater vehicle. All of this equipment is still on board the steel hulled sunken boat.Growing up on the South Haven waterfront, Bradley has always had a passion for shipwrecks and has owned a boat to help him look for them.Bradley has been hunting shipwrecks since he acquired his first boat at age 11. "I dragged a hook behind my rowboat," he said.The Baum has greeted many visiting ships. Its top speed is 8 knots per hour. It's slow but very strong, Bradley said.The sound of the tug's whistle is a familiar sound to South Haven residents and visitors. Everybody hopes to see the old tugboat again chug down the Black River.